Call for Testing

We all want openSUSE 11.1 to be the best release yet, and we need your help to get there. This release is ready for widespread testing, and we’re encouraging everyone to download and work with the testing releases to find any critical bugs before release. Please run the release through your usual routine, and let us know about any bugs or other issues that you find.

Remember that this is a release candidate, and is not suitable for use on production systems, however. Though many openSUSE users can and do use the Factory distribution and/or testing releases for day-to-day work we want to stress that it’s entirely possible that you will encounter serious bugs.

What’s changed since beta 5?

See the Factory News page for changes in the Factory distribution between release announcements. DistroWatch also carries an expanded list of packages being shipped in the Factory distribution.

Media and Download

11.1 RC 1 can be found at http://software.opensuse.org/developer. See http://en.opensuse.org/Mirror_Selection for a full list of mirrors. Note that you don’t need to choose a mirror yourself, but you can use the mirror list if you want or need to select a mirror manually.

Most Annoying Bugs

While many bugs have been eliminated since the last beta, we still have a few remaining (and new) bugs that testers should be aware of:

Bug 448270: the license has no translations yet
Bug 449711: no OpenOffice for ppc
Bug 449422: Amarok2 on KDE4 does not stop
Bug 449513: Novell vpn doesn’t work at novell-ipsec-tools 0.7.1.

Future Release Announcements

Note to openSUSE contributors: If you have any changes or features to call out for future release announcements, please send an email to Zonker with any information that should be in that announcement. (Preferably at least two days before the scheduled release.

Great news that the RC has eliminated most of the bugs (although your bug for “Amarok2 on KDE4 does not stop” should be 442175, not 449422). The earlier betas proved too buggy for my laptop, e.g. Beta 5 would not store my wireless WPA password, rendering wireless unusable. If that’s been fixed, then I’ll upgrade now rather than wait for the GM, as 11.0 doesn’t work with my wireless chipset at all.

I’m guessing that nvidia drivers will need to be installed manually? And will the non-free codecs and java that are already installed be removed in the upgrade?

I didn’t install the RC on my laptop as it took a while to download via torrent. I’m glad I didn’t as it seems (from messages below) that the wrong kernel source was on the repos, and so the nvidia driver could not be installed.

With that and the external drive ntfs bug, it seems this RC is still more like a beta. Beta 5 was a disaster – who’s bright idea was it to change the KDE network manager at such a late stage? It meant that anyone like me who had problems with it could not test Beta 5 on a laptop, and now the RC also feels underprepared.

10.3 and 11.0 were both great releases, but I fear Opensuse could loose some fans by releasing too early, unless a LOT of work is done in the few days left before the GM goes to the mirrors.

That bug and its variants are everywhere. I can’t connect to any secure networks in any linux based OS I’ve ever seen; it just discards the password I give it and replaces it with random garbage and tries to connect with that instead. If SuSE fixes that bug before Ubuntu does, it’s worth switching for.

I should point out that Amarok2 RC1 is not the default media player; it’s not finished and is only shipped as a preview. Amarok 1.4.10 will be the default since we all think reliable music management is essential.

I would welcome a release that actually “works” for a change. Every previous release had dependencies on packages that could not be provided which is incredibly irritating. A good example is KDE4 – if you have an nVidiacard it’s bloody hard work. Having said that, going back to 3.5 gives at least more usable software..

I find it a little “Debian-esque” that 11.1 will be the last build to support KDE 3.5, but rather than dealing with bugs in the still-fairly-fresh KDE4, there are plans to use KDE 3 programs rather than the “latest and greatest”.

If there are applications that are not ported to KDE4 or that are just too immature, then we use already in 11.1 the KDE3.5 version, e.g. we’ll use the KDE3 amarok. I assume this will happen with 11.2 as well – but those are single applications and not the complete desktop.

Looking good, but on the x64 that i installed some problems.
At this time only working with root, i did not get the dutch translation.
Also the onboard soundcard gave a error (asus m2a-vm motherboard,ALC883 High Definition Audio 6-channel CODEC ).
The kernel-source needs to be update to latest version, so i can install the NVIDIA driver.
When closing down YOU i have a “broken pipe” error.

| Looking good, but on the x64 that i installed some problems.
I was planning to say exactly the same as you did ;)

| At this time only working with root, i did not get the dutch translation.
Don’t have this.

| Also the onboard soundcard gave a error (asus m2a-vm motherboard,ALC883 High Definition Audio 6-channel CODEC ).
I have the same problem on KDE4, phonon give a popup error. I have a P5Q mainboard from Asus with the same audio chip.

| The kernel-source needs to be update to latest version, so i can install the NVIDIA driver.
Yep same here, I can install Nvidia and see the splash screen but than fails to load, KDE use NV again.

| When closing down YOU i have a â€œbroken pipeâ€ error.
I don’t have seen this I think.

PS. I hope to see extra mouse button support by default, I have a logitech 620 mouse and the back/forward and zoom buttons don’t work, on Ubuntu and vista it works out of the box.

I installed RC1 via NET-i586.iso. I had to use a http-proxy with authentication.
After providing linuxrc with the correct username:password@proxy:port it loaded the yast installation system at first.
However after being in yast (install) it failed to load the repo. It helped to switch to console before yast-install and edit the /etc/sysconfig/proxy to reflect the proxy-settings. It seems the proxy settings are “forgotten”. After that I had to retry the first errormessage, using the “proxyless” download-urls (default) wich worked with the sysconfig settings…

I advise you to update memtest86+ from 2.01 version to the new 2.10.
This new releases correct many annoying bugs like test freeze on dual channel quad banks (and more?) AMD memory systems (tested and verified with memtest86+ 2.01 (OpenSuSE) vs. 2.10 ISO image).

I tested both x86_64 and i586 distro’s on a brand spankin new dg45fc motherboard from Intel, at beta5, my video now works, sound doesn’t yet – but I’ll be looking at RC1 closely and will provide feedback.

Thanks everyone for all the hard work, it’s looking really good so far.

Anyone got *detailed* instructions on how to perform a distro upgrade (e.g. zypper dup) ? Which repositories need to be removed/disabled, which added? I would actually suggest that this becomes part of the announcement, at least as a “link to instructions”.

Thanks!

(I gave “five” as a spam protection answer to “Sum of two+three” and it was rejected! too bad ;-)

I’ m testing it now and, its ok but I have 2 problems.
1) my pc has no sound on the speakers the headset workt well, after unplugging the headset no sound but after plugging it in again both are working (strange behavior) :(
Yast say i have a 82801ji (ich10 family) HD Audio Contraller (hda-intel)
I have a asus P5Q de luxe mainboard and realtek audio chip on board (i think it’s an 883)

2) How to activate Compiz on KDE3? I have activate nvidia composit but compiz-icon will not start (only a bouncing cursor) And CCSM also does nothing.
Do I miss something here?

the option probe_mask=1 ( or 2 or 4 or 8, it is a bit mask )
stops the snd-hda-intel from probing more than one card ( my ich9 is a alc883 + an alc268 )
and made the sound work.
the model= was necessary to make the plug/unplug headphone switch off / on the main speakers.
you should begin with probe_mask=1 only to see what happens.
no need to reboot:
unload your kmixer, rmmod snd_hda_intel, then modprobe snd-hda-intel

(note the underscores in “snd_hda_intel” are for unloading (rmmod), the hyphens in “snd-hda-intel” are for modprobing (loading) the module !!!!)

I downloaded the OpenSuse 11.1 RC1 Gnome LiveCD but I couldn’t get it to install.
In fact when the installer creates the new partitions at the beginning of the actual installation process, they are mounted auotmatically and immediately by the system, so the installer obviously cannot proceed formatting a partition which is currently mounted and the installation process is aborted automatically.
Am I the only one who got this issue/bug?

well…the most annoying bugs (for me) are e.g. (in KDE4) that some applications (kate, terminal, konqueror) don’t remember the size or when my monitor switches off an on, every now and then. This sucks, especially when you typing something :). I have an ati X1800 with hdradeon driver. I didn’t have that problem with radeon driver.

Another thing i noticed (in beta 5, didn’t test it with rc1 yet), is that X server went up to 100% cpu usage. It happened twice. No kde applications were running and the monitor was switched off. I was logged on over ssh when i noticed that.

It is not a new version yet. It is still in ending stages for the upcomming new version. this is a Release canidate. Please have patience, the new repo lists will be comming as soon as a gm (GoldMaster) release is complete, or possibly until public release short;y after.

Hi, I don’t know where to post, so it just be here, I hope a get any tips on this…
I had downloaded the x64 11.1 RC1 version, and I’ve got an weird behaviour on my system, my LCD screen are attached throught the DVI port on my ATI 4870×2 vga card, and I just get the boot logo showing it’s progress botting from the CD, but when it attempts to enter on X, then I get BLACK screen, but the system is there, because I tried Ctrl-Alt-F1 for a terminal, typed “reboot” and my system came to a reboot, but no screen at all, and EVEN weird, after the reboot or HARD rebooting the system, I loose completely my screen, even for posting the BIOS or other installed OS, then I have to unplug from the wall my whole system, and turn it on again to work the other things….

Still have problems with USB ports, when using a pen-drive the system recognizes, but can not display the files. Both the KDE4 version of SuSE 11.1 beta-5 as in RC1, because the final version of openSUSE 11.0 this flaw does not occur.
I am testing on a laptop Compal HEL-81 (32bit) or in a desktop PC Intel Core2 (64bits), and both have the following message:
“An error occurred while ‘Senac-1′, the system responded:” org.freedesktop.Hal.Device.Volume.UnknownFailure: ALL: have to rethink extra options ”
It appears that these two latest “beta” this flaw has not been corrected.

All versions from beta1 to rc1 have bugs…but there’re some very VERY annoying like Mounting USB drives with NTFS filesystem in kde4 – “Have to rethink extra options” error message in Dolphin….damn HAL and KDE…so many posts and bug reports and nothing to do with it?…What’s the problem? I hate going to the Konsole and doing things like mounting. These things are to be very user-friendly etc. BTW Mandriva fixed that bug! What you are waiting for?

Hope the new version fixes some of the dramatic errors I get with 11.0 e.g
When connecting USB perpheals via a USB hub you get:
1.External USB Freecom harddrive loses directories crashes konqueror and open office and slows evrything down or freezes suse altogether
2.For even more spectacular surprises try using the Freecom external hard drive with a space in the volume name eg CLASSIC SL
3.Printer (standard HP4200 deskjet) works some days when it feels like it, other days not at all.
Introducing lots of extra cables to bypass the hub gets rid of most of the problems as far as I can see. (never seen any problems under windows)

Expensive 8600 GTS Nvidia card only works at 800*600. No 3D.

Hopefully the painfull and time consuming experience of tring to get your internet connection working with a ISDN USB Fritcard under 10.1-10.3 kernels will not be repeated in 11.1

One of the problems with linux, that keeps it from appealing to the masses, is the incomplete error reporting. If linux does not support ISDN or USB hubs can it not just bring up an error message when you try and connect it rather than the user spend hours fiddling with configuration tools that show the device apparently present and correct.

Sounds a bit negative but I would like linux to get over its instabilities and succeed.

There’s a problem with it – that I’ve seen on all the other versions of 11.1 – which is that the screen display is unstable. It blinks with a period of several seconds and it doesn’t matter if it’s live or installed. The hardware is a SiS integrated motherboard which works perfectly under OpenSUSE 11.0, so I’m confused as to what has happened here. I’d have figured that the video drivers wouldn’t have changed much – if at all – so has anyone out there got any ideas on what’s causing the problem and how it can be fixed?

I want the GM of 11.1 to be usable – but as I use linux for my business, unless it’s fixable, I’m going to have to stay with 11.0 or switch to another distro (which is one of my least popular alternatives as OpenSUSE is probably the most configurable of the lot!).

you know I had the same issue with a motherboard based on a SiS chipset with SiS integrated graphics card. I’m losing the screen for a second only in kde4 when moving the cursor a little bit around or doing some activity. When the desktop is idle – the screen doesn’t blink. MAy be it’s a bug?

Raises the question as to where the bug is. I can’t believe that there’s only two of us having this problem on SiS integrated boards. If it’s somehow tied into the mouse driver, I’m stuffed as I have all my machines on a KVM switch.

Very nice release!
KDE 4 works perfect in VirtualBox now. But there is a problem. After updating the system it told me to log out and in again. I restarted the system and now the screen is black and won’t start up…

I just want to mention the famous bug “flash player always on top” in firefox.Fedora 10 do not suffer from this disease anymore, neither Ubuntu 8.10. Is there a fix on the way? For me is this is show-stopper.

I’ve downloaded the RC1 dvd image, disabled all other repositories in my 11.0, did “zypper dup”, which installed about 100MB some packages, and retbooted. After reboot the system won’t let me log in with a message “Unknown module” – obviously PAM-related. The branding is still the old one, e.g. 11.0, not 11.1 . Have to go with fresh install obviously. Might be nice if the upgrade possibilities would be better polished, and better documented as well.

Hello, I have not found an address to post my bug-report, so I use this list.

One of my computers is an old Pentium-mmx (mobile) with 128MB of RAM (Dell Latitude CP233). While installing 11.0 the question was raised which part of the HD should be used for swap. Now, with 11.1RC1 (and beta’s before) this question is not asked. After downloading the Installation System (2/6) the system crashes, flashing the keyboard lights. I used in both cases the NET.i586.iso image. Maybe not using a swap space is unrelated, in which case the system crashes for some unknown reason.

Have you checked the integrity of your installation media? The first time I tried openSuse (11.0), I had problems similar to yours. Cutting a long story short, I ended up burning a new DVD and the installation worked fine.

I am having the same problem. An old Gateway Solo 3350, Pentium III with 512kb memory, and I get to the “Loading Installation System (2/6) (1 kB) – 100%_” and it freezes and flashes the keyboard lights at me. I ran the checksums and all came out clear, and I’m still having the problem.

Wow. This is great. I think i sticked to long to Ubuntu. Openususe is so much more professional, so mature, so stable. And KDE wonderful. It is the nicest thing I’ve ever seen on a laptop. It is almost as nice as OSX. Thanks. Sofie

Great release, shurly it will be the best release ever.
Only one thing, the kernel and kernel-source package for the 2.6.6.27-8 is out of sync.
Or are there other repos to find the corresponding kernel-source?
Thank a lot
Dirk

OpenSuse 11.1 RC 32bit is running well on T61 – incorrect lcd settings though. Nvidia 180.08 BETA compiles and works with NVS 140 – the lagging in Nautilus and so on is gone. KDE 4.2 BETA from unstable works well using KDE 3 Networkmanager. Being a bit conservative with plasmoids is a pre.

I tried to install rc1 on a dual boot system and I have the same problem as above. The computer starts, then goes to a blank screen. This is on a HP dv9210us laptop. 11.0 worked perfectly. I am assuming that the problem lies with the NTFS read bug.

When upgrading to newer releases like moving from beta5 to RC1 by doing “zypper dup”, is there a way to point to delta rpm repos instead of full rpm repos? Also maintaining a factory repo with delta rpms and base rpms IMO is a good idea. It will reduce the download size if newer versions of packages are available in the factory. Expanding this delta rpm concept from just ‘updates’ repo to all repos, IMO, will greatly reduce the activity on the server.

I am begining to think opensuse is a game not an operating system.I hae played with it since 9.3,and it never gets to a stable issue because every 6 months it gets changed.then updates bring dependent errors.I always buy a boxed set but never again.

In my view beta 4 was better than 5 or rc1. there are still no printer drivers, update from the task bar does not work. No Nvidia driver. rc1 no beta 3 more like.

I do not like Ubunto but was given an rc1 Mint 6 and every thing works just fine.I would prefer once a year issues with updates that do not upset the system

No one is forcing anybody, or course… but unfortunately many new bug get introduced in each new release, and due to the release policy only major bugs or security flaws get fixed after the release. That leaves you with a system with bugs in some corners, and many people — including me — hope that a new release will wipe them out. Thus, I always do the update. Of course, that makes no sense as long as there’s more or as many new bugs as fixed old ones…

A good example for that is wifi support: we have a history of delivering buggy drivers (ath5k in 11.0, and now iwl3945) which are usually not getting a fix soon, i.e. before the next release!

If you ask me, testing a Linux distribution in a virtual machine has close to zero worth since it is exactly those things that are not discovered in time.

Things would not look so bleak if one could count on a later bugfix, though. But, personally, I have given up on that.

And yes, I agree to the OP: RC1 is worse than Beta 4 has been: wifi/network now broken, new KDE issues (some others fixed of course), update applet seems broken to me, etc…

After a lot of difficulties installing version 11 on my Fujitsu Lifebook, I must say that I am quite impressed with the RC1. Installation was much smoother and even the fingerprint reader was detected and is integrated nicely into the system.
Can’t wait for the release version :-)